We’ve had a rather interesting response to our news piece on David S Gallant’s decision to not distribute Steam keys to GamerGate supporters for his game “I Get This Call Every Day”. David has decided to call us out on Twitter as a result.
"We didn't contact David but we published this anyways" http://t.co/Yim1pIucML Great fucking journalism, PowerGamer.
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
Article is riddled with "we aren't sure how" and "it hasn't been made clear", all of which could have been solved with an email, PowerGamer
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
Hey @PowerGamerHQ, for every "we don't know" in this article http://t.co/Yim1pIucML you could have acted like a journo and emailed me.
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
.@PowerGamerHQ My email is right on my website, which is linked in my bio. It is not hard to find.
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
.@PowerGamerHQ But you decided to run with incomplete information, instead of doing bare minimum journalism. Great job.
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
.@PowerGamerHQ Also, FYI, the game is no longer for sale for $200. Just a little correction for you.
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
As requested by Mr. Gallant, we’re posting his full response to our piece below (albeit rather belatedly since David has decided to take it upon himself to release the content of said email publicly anyways)
“Liam,
Here are the mistakes in your article:
– I Get This Call Every Day was never pulled from Steam. The game has been Greenlit, but has not yet launched on Steam. My initial decision was to not launch it on Steam in the first place, a decision I later rescinded.
– My Storify made no reference towards Valve’s stance on GamerGate.
– FastSpring and Sellbox cannot distribute Steam keys so they will not be asked to comply with the request. Customers who purchased using those storefronts have been migrated to Humble.
– My name is not spelled with a period after the S. It is “David S Gallant”.
Here is an answer to all the issues the article was unclear about:
– I have not changed my stance with regards to Steam’s importance to “gamer” culture – it is still the largest, most trafficked distributor of digital games on the internet. There is still a part of me that would very much like to leave Steam behind. However, the aforementioned friend who talked me out of this idea did so by reminding me that keeping the game off Steam would only disadvantage myself to spite no one in particular. It was a wise piece of advice, and I took it to heart. I did not update my website or the game’s Facebook page, however, as I was not anticipating a mass amount of attention being paid to the game until it was actually ready for release. I got lazy.
– Here’s what I’m doing: I am comparing the email addresses associated with each purchase to any Twitter accounts associated with those addresses. If I see an account supporting GamerGate, I flag it. When I am ready to distribute keys, I will work with my storefront partners to see if they can prevent those accounts from receiving keys. I have not contacted Humble or itch.io to see if this is even possible. The process will be impossible to undertake for Desura customers, so any Desura purchasers will receive a Steam key regardless of their support of GamerGate.
For the record, sending a single email to clarify information prior to publication of an article is not “spamming”, particularly when you admit to contacting third parties for more info but not your article’s subject.”
Sincerely,
David S Gallant”
As requested, we have made amendments to the article in question based on the points made.
I think the most important thing to note here is that we make very clear in the news piece that David’s response to TechRaptor was to cite the Storify (“I am familiar with TechRaptor, including it’s (sic) current stance on the hate movement that has harmed both my friends and my family. The information you are looking for is here“). Since David made it clear that he feels GamerGate is a hate movement, I decided that it would not be appropriate to bother him any further given our support of GamerGate.
Instead, we decided to stick to reporting on the tweets and Storify that had already been made. Note that I did not make any further allegations, I did however speculate on how exactly David would go about delivering such a system, which he has now kindly decided to advise upon.
Given my busy work life and inability to focus 100% attention on PowerGamer during the day, the only thing I managed to get done in relation to this was contact David back during my lunch break. I had not (and still have not) contacted any of the outlets that IGTCED was being sold from. However, one outlet, Desura, has already responded to the controversy:
Noticed the @PowerGamerHQ article explicitly said it hadn't contacted me, but would be contacting Desura, Humble, itch.io et al about me
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
@davidsgallant @PowerGamerHQ Actually, quite a number of people contacted Desura regarding this fuss – You may want to clear the air a bit?
— Desura (@Desura) December 2, 2014
@davidsgallant @PowerGamerHQ I know our Support Team would be happier if you did, considering they've got other stuff to deal with…
— Desura (@Desura) December 2, 2014
@Desura Huh, this is the first contact I've received from you on the matter. In any case, I already did. https://t.co/uog85nyLgJ
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
@Desura Was honestly expecting an email if you needed information clarified.
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
@davidsgallant No clarification necessary, I think you know that keys are not distributed in a selective manner at Desura. (Nor would we).
— Desura (@Desura) December 2, 2014
@Desura I honestly didn't know, having never linked keys with my game before. Now I know, though the point is moot anyways.
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
@davidsgallant I wasn't contacting you on this matter… I was responding to a tweet. However, it did create an unnecessary flurry of email
— Desura (@Desura) December 2, 2014
@Desura I understand that. I wasn't exactly ready to make my plan public before inquiring about the parts that were possible or not…
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
@Desura … but unfortunately GamerGate forced my hand in that matter. My apologies for causing this.
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
@davidsgallant The point will become moot if you stop tweeting about it – Now you have your own mini-drama – Ironic wouldn't you say?
— Desura (@Desura) December 2, 2014
@davidsgallant Honestly… Nobody forced your hand. You decide just how involved you want to get in the matter.
— Desura (@Desura) December 2, 2014
@Desura Not a big fan of this condescending tone you're giving me right now. I did not anticipate this becoming a mass issue when it did.
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
@Desura I apologize for the workload you've received; I'll help in any way that I can.
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
@davidsgallant It's just the truth mate. You openly took your opinion to new levels by issuing a threat that isn't even viable. Not cool…
— Desura (@Desura) December 2, 2014
@Desura Who do I need to contact within Desura to remove the game from active sale?
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
@davidsgallant No need… Let's just drop it, and that will be that. No sense making DavidGGate out of this.
— Desura (@Desura) December 2, 2014
I Get This Call Every Day is no longer for sale via Desura. Existing customers retain their purchase and will receive Steam keys.
— avatar == butt (@davidsgallant) December 2, 2014
I have to commend Desura’s stance on this, since they have decided to do the right thing and not discriminate based on a particular affiliation that those who purchased the game might have. However, this has left a very bitter taste in my mouth, as I’m disappointed that David has decided to remove his game from sale on Desura as a result of the response that they provided. I think consumer choice is excellent, and clearly there is a market for the type of degenerative art style and gameplay that IGTCED provides.
Unfortunately, it’s our responsibility to be advocates for consumers, not PR companies or devs, and whilst we strive to focus purely on analysing and dissecting the art form of Gaming, we must also take a firm stance against anti consumer practices when they’re brought to our attention. Not living up to promises that had been made previously is simply not cricket. Quite frankly this whole episode was an avoidable tragedy.
UPDATE (04/12/2014): I’ve received an update from David S Gallant with the following:
“Please note the update made to the Storify: